Detroit Reanimated

by Michael Halliday

  The cruiser was quiet other than Matthew singing along to a song on Evan’s phone and playing a game. His foot tapped on the back of Evans seat to the rhythm. He had a pretty good voice for a twelve-year-old.

  “We’re almost there,” Evan told everyone.

  A car had gone into a sign that told the distance to Albuquerque and it hung half way into the interstate.

  A familiar sound came from Evan’s phone shortly after, and Matthew’s eyes widened. He shut off the game and looked for the source.

  “You got a text from Sarah Carter,” he announced.

  “What? Do I have a signal?” Evan asked, half worried about the text, and excited at the same time.

  “Yeah, looks like it…” he replied. Matt dialed the number to his home in Denver and waited a few seconds. “Holy shit, it’s ringing!”

  “Here, let me have it please,” Edward asked Matthew. “Evan, try to get Doug to stop.”

  Evan started to honk the horn and Doug’s Police SUV came to a stop. Doug got out and hurried back to the cruiser.

  “Is everything alright?” Doug asked when Evan opened his window.

  Edward gave Evan the phone. Unable to look at the message, Evan gave the phone over to Doug.

  “You have a signal?” Doug said with an excited grin. Evan nodded and Doug noticed the worried expression on Evan’s face. “You also received another text from Sarah. Want me read it?”

  “Go ahead. Hopefully it’s not like the one from yesterday… Doug, look behind you.”

  Doug slowly spun around to discover three graceless forms approaching, nearly twenty yards away.

  “Mary, give me the bat down by your feet,” Evan requested. Evan passed his bat to Doug and took Mary’s. He got out of the cruiser and prepared to fight off the tattered biters that ambled toward them.

  “Remember, swing as if your life depends on it, because it does,” Doug stated.

  *Pong*

  Evan swung with a fatal strike at the nearest one - a scruffy and robust man - across the face. The strike shattered his jaw and he stumbled backward. Before he had a chance to recover, another swing came down and struck his forehead with a loud crack. The biter’s forehead collapsed on itself and the large undead man dropped to the ground. Evan struck repeatedly until he thought the man was completely destroyed.

  The attack on the other two was blinding fast as Doug and Evan looked like they were becoming professionals. The undead had no chance to recover if the initial blow didn’t kill them.

  “I’m never going to get used to this,” Evan said. He tried to wipe the blood from his face with a sleeve.

  “Used to it, no,” Doug agreed. “But we better learn to deal with it. I sure as hell hope we don’t lose ourselves in destroying them. Just don’t make a sport of it.”

  “Count on that,” Evan said seriously. “I promise you, right now, that I will help you hold together, if you help me do the same.”

  Evan held out his hand - covered in blood - for a deal. Doug took it and they came to an understanding. The look of on Evan’s face was an assurance that made the former cop confident that Evan would stand by his promise.

  Not knowing what the two were talking about before the shake made Edward uneasy. He also saw that Matt had watched each and every swing closely and with awe, which also worried him. Matt gave him a look as if saying ‘why didn’t you go out there and help them?’

  Evan searched the immediate area and found those were the only ones that posed a threat. Doug went back to looking at the phone and saw there was still a signal and read the text message out loud.

  “’Evan, hope you are ok, if you get this, call me… Sarah.’ Evan, it was sent shortly before those biters attacked!”

  -----

  In Detroit, Sarah thought she heard a phone ringing to realize it was coming from her. Her heart started racing when she saw that it was Evan. The Detroit power grid had started to shut down and the survivors scrambled to the Home Depot to see if there were portable power generators there.

  “Evan? Oh my god… Is that you?” Sarah asked, completely ecstatic from receiving the call in the first place.

  “Sarah? Hey, yeah… Can you hear me?” Evan said from the other end.

  “I can hear you just fine… Oh God, it’s so great to hear your voice!” Sarah said as she almost choked from the emotions.

  “Are you ok up there?” Evan asked, choking up himself.

  “I’m fine, Tracy and I are fine. How are you? Are you still in Phoenix?”

  “No, I’m just west of Albuquerque. I have a group of people with me and we’re coming up to you. Sarah, I have so much to tell you!”

  “Mark… Have you heard from him?” Sarah asked.

  There was a brief moment of hesitation from Evan.

  “Sarah, he called me yesterday, and he said someone had stabbed him. Someone was also shooting at him. After that he was gone.”

  “Did he say anything else?” She inquired, as her heart sank. “Did he say where he was?”

  “Yeah, near Composite Forgings and the old Greyhound Station. Where are you, Sarah?”

  Sarah had begun to think of how she was going to convince Scott to help her get to Mark and she didn’t hear Evan calling her name.

  “Sarah?” Craig put his hand on her shoulder and she snapped back.

  “Sarah, are you still with me?” Evan called frantically.

  “Yeah, Evan, I’m here. We have close to forty survivors. Detroit is still standing, but there are a lot of these things.”

  “Have you heard from my parents?” Evan asked. He knew the likely answer already.

  “I’m sorry, I haven’t,” Sarah said. “You said you have people with you? How many are there?”

  “We have eight people. There are three kids, a teen, and four adults,” Evan replied.

  “Evan, I’m so sorry for the way I let you know about Colleen and the kids. I should have found a better way.”

  “Sarah, you don’t need to worry about it. We’ll bury them when we get home, but you didn’t give me any false hopes. I’m not upset.”

  “I would have been,” Sarah said sullenly. “Who else is with you?”

  “There’s Doug Silver, a Phoenix cop, and his wife, Nikki. She’s a neurosurgeon. They have two kids, Eliot and Simon, and Judge Edward Morrison. Then there’s Mary, Matthew and myself.”

  “Sounds like a good bunch. Evan, I need you to do something.”

  “Ok, you have my attention,” Evan said.

  “There’s a girl by herself behind you. She’s driving a classic car and she’s coming from Pasadena. If you could wait for her and let her come with you, I’d be grateful.”

  “What’s her name?” Evan asked.

  “Mandy Ford,” Sarah responded. “She said she was near Grants.”

  “We’ll wait for her,” Evan promised.

  -----

  “I’m going to find him,” Sarah said. “Are you coming, Craig?”

  “Sarah, please. We should think about this some more,” Scott pleaded. “We don’t know how bad it is out in that area. It could be swarming with shamblers.”

  “Scott’s right, Sarah, we need to plan this out. But we did promise we are going to get your husband. Correct, Scott?” Edgar asked to make sure Scott hadn’t used Sarah.

  “My promise stands. We just have to be careful. We’re sending out a team with you.”

  “I’m going too!” Tracy demanded.

  “Oh no, you are not, young lady.”

  “He’s my dad! I want to be there! Please, please let me go!” Tracy begged.

  Sarah saw the contemptuous look on her daughter’s face. She had never seen Tracy so angry before. Not letting her go would devastate her.

  “You better do exactly what I say!”

  Sarah’s recovery team was assembled quickly. The team included Robert and Craig, the new comers Walter, Jeremy and Anthony. Tracy also went along.

  The team turned onto Fort Street and went east. Up ahead they
found a burnt out police cruiser sitting in the middle of the road. Sarah’s hope slowly died as they got closer. The team got out and searched the area until they found a police officer lying face down with multiple gunshot wounds, including one to the head. Anthony gently flipped Mark over and searched for other wounds. Mark had no bite marks, but he did have a puncture wound just below the sternum.

  Sarah went over to the wall and vomited. She then began to pound on a metal door in anger and heart-rending grief. In her heart, she her knew that he was already dead. All that remained was the hatred toward the people who committed this murder against her husband.

  She looked down and found Mark’s crushed cell phone and picked it up with her trembling hands.

  Jeremy helped Robert carry Mark’s body to Edgar’s cargo van. They later found a small field near the safe zone to bury Evan’s older brother. Twenty people from the zone supported Sarah by holding a small service for him. Jasper suggested that Sarah should say one of the best things she remembered about him.

  “He always worked at finding ways to say something nice to both Tracy and me,” Sarah recalled. “He would send me off to work with an inspiring word and something sweet for Tracy to take with her to school. He was such a kind man. This new world needs someone like Mark.”

  -----

  While Sarah made her remark on the world needing more people like Mark, the man who took Mark’s life stood over the body of a man he killed for his gathered food. Greg Bernard Harrison, who was better known as “Skink” was exactly the type of person the world needed less now.

  “No!” a shrilly voiced woman screamed at the murderer. She came at him with fury and he stabbed her in the throat with the same knife that he killed Mark with. When she fell to the ground and struggled to take in breath, Skink wasted no time and stabbed her a dozen more times, including a finishing slash into her temple. Three others from the man’s group stood in disbelief. Max Jones held a rifle on them and decided to shoot them down for the hell of it.

  “You promised not to kill them,” Steve Franklin growled at Max.

  “Is that so?” Max asked with disdain. “Skink, did I say that?”

  “I didn’t hear you say that. That was fun, actually.”

  Max and Skink gathered the food and belongings that they had ambushed the small group of survivors for. They made Steve carry it all to the truck they had taken from another group earlier. Since the crisis had started, Max, the father of Craig Jones, had killed thirteen people, while Skink killed twenty. It was all a game to them.

  The grass in Detroit was bleached because of an oppressively hot, dry summer, and before the event had started, city officials had banned any outdoor activities including barbecues or activities associated with fire.

  Such a patch of grass lay before Skink, and he threw a burning cigarette to the ground. It was the worst thing that could have happened to the city. The consequence was a massive wall of fire that burned most of downtown Detroit to the ground. There was no one that could stop the spread of the flames, and abandoned vehicles added to the infernal as it was carried with a dry wind eastward.

  The wall of fire had so much fuel ahead of it that the flames had become so hot it melted car frames to unrecognizable blobs. Every building in the downtown area became pillars of flames within hours. Gas stations that were left behind exploded and massive billowing orbs of fire and smoke rose slowly.

  Survivors from the safe zone went to the roof to watch the flames touch the sky, while August gazed at the orange huh from the south east.

  ‘What the hell is going on out there?’ August asked herself.

  That night, the power went out throughout most of Michigan. No one was able to monitor or maintain the power plants across the state. Cell phone towers were completely dead as their own generators ran out of reserve fuel.

  In Warren, which was one of the locations for a refugee camp, a National Guard colonel also watched the carnage in the south. He or his subordinates didn’t know what to make of the fire, but he couldn’t worry about it. He only had forty men left as many had deserted since the crisis had begun. Those who stayed did so out of fear or they didn’t have any place better to go.

  “Get back to filling those lines, assholes!” the colonel yelled at his subordinates. “It’s starting to smell around here.”

  -----

  Alex and his team all lay on their stomachs as they observed five people walking around on top of a Walmart roof. These people were obviously keeping something guarded, since they were armed with bows.

  The morning sun provided a lot of information for Alex to give August when he returned. He saw large pales of arrows spread out in different positions on the roof. Alex also saw that the people were using the tower on top of the building as a watch stand, and there were two guard stations in the front of the store.

  “Crafty bastards,” Alex said to his two companions. “They’ve been busy. That must be what the smoke was all about.”

  Alex directed their attention to a line of dark piles on the opposite side of the parking lot.

  “Do we approach them?” one of the troops asked.

  “Not yet,” Alex replied. “They might decide just to shoot as soon as we show our faces. We need to give them time, and find the right way.”

  “And they’re well armed. Check that out,” the third soldier stated with a dual finger point at a three man crew that appeared with seven foot long spears.

  Alex looked at the trio with his rifle’s scope, and he saw that one of the men carried a rifle on his back. The other two had handgun holsters on their belts.

  “Incoming sir,” the second soldier said.

  Alex decided to kill the half dozen reanimated people that moved in their direction. He wanted to have more time to observe these people. All six were taken down with ease between him and his two companions, and they did so without being detected.

  The specialist went back to observing the store. A cargo van had appeared, and the three men with the spears all got inside. As the van drove off, Alex also decided to leave, but he knew the sun would have set before he had gotten the team back to the bowling alley.

  Alex decided to find a secure place to hide his team and get some sleep

  He led the men back to the alley to report their findings where August waited. She was relieved that they all came back alive for the most part. She took the three out of earshot of the good doctor.

  “So, what did you find?” she asked.

  “There looks to be a setup at a store to the south,” Alex began. “They are armed with compound bows, which I can understand, and they have guns too. We saw eight people walking around outside, and a cargo van had left just as we did.”

  “What do you think it is?” August prodded the specialist.

  “It’s not military, I don’t think. The smoke came from piles of burned bodies. There were a lot of piles actually, so the dead are most likely the risen.”

  “Do you think they could be a problem?” August asked.

  “My gut said no. I think they are just a group of people who came together and aren’t a bunch of slackers. They look like they can handle themselves, but I don’t see them as a threat,” the second soldier replied. The third agreed.

  “I agree with them, but I think we should give them a bit more time. We don’t know how they feel about us right now,” Alex advised.

  “We’ll dress in civvies then when we do approach them,” August decided.

  “I would like to go when we do make contact,” Alex requested. “I want to see what they’re doing in that building.”

  Chapter 6: Rendezvous Point

  Evan sat on the hood of his cruiser keeping a watch out for Mandy. He occasionally peeked through his rifle’s sights at the horizon.

  While the group waited, Doug, Matt, Eliot and Simon were playing Go Fish, which saw the seven-year-old Silver clear out everyone.

  A black and white classic car appeared over a hill and Evan stood on the cruiser’s bum
per to get a better look. Doug went to the cruiser and looked in the direction Evan was looking, but didn’t see anything. He then looked at Evan in confusion.

  “What is it?” Doug asked.

  “Wait a sec,” Evan told him.

  The car reappeared over another hill, closer this time, so that Evan could make out the type.

  “Is that her?” Doug asked.

  “I believe it is,” Evan replied.

  Matt joined them as they watched the car approach. It took another five minutes before she had finally gotten out of the car. Mandy held the door open for a minute to let something else out, and spoke to whatever it was.

  ‘California, oh boy,’ Evan thought to himself. ‘That better not be a damn Chihuahua.’

  To Evan’s satisfaction, it wasn’t a Chihuahua. He had no idea what it was, but the pup was small. Mandy was also a knockout in her appearance. She was stunningly beautiful, with long, brown hair that was nearly straight. She appeared confident, but humble at the same time. Evan had met a few Californian girls in his young life, and they were as snotty as they were gorgeous. Mandy left the attitude in her old state.

  “Hi, are you Evan Carter?” Mandy asked the right man.

  “Yes, ma’am, I would be,” Evan replied.

  “I figured as much, you have that geeky, but charming look that Sarah described. Don’t take geek as an insult. I am too.”

  ‘Uh oh,’ Evan thought.

  “You’re welcome to travel with us,” Doug said. “What’s the pup’s name?”

  “He’s Brewster. I found him on the way. I have no idea what breed he is.”

  “He would be a coyote,” Doug told her. All eyes went to Doug with widened eyes. “I’m not kidding.”

  “How do you know?” Mandy asked.

  “I had to take care of a litter once on someone’s property,” Doug replied.

  “And it’s not coming with us,” Edward told the group. “Miss, you are welcome, but that thing isn’t.”

  “Edward,” Evan began to say.

  “They are wild animals and they don’t belong with us. We have too many problems as it is. I’m sorry, but…”

  Doug had enough. He interrupted Edward by pulling him away from the group and shoved him to the ground.